


The rock came down and...

by TimeWarSnapShot



Category: Doctor Who, Doctor Who (1963), Doctor Who (2005), Doctor Who (Big Finish Audio), Doctor Who: Unbound: Full Fathom Five (Big Finish Audio)
Genre: Doctor Who Unbound, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-03-18
Updated: 2021-03-18
Packaged: 2021-03-27 15:48:52
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,509
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/30125157
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/TimeWarSnapShot/pseuds/TimeWarSnapShot
Summary: As the First Doctor readies himself to kill a stricken ally, the psycho-temporal fallout of the action stretches down through the Doctor's lifetimes towards his final death deep beneath the waves...An exploration of the Full Fathom Five Doctor's lives in snapshot, from the events of An Unearthly Child through to Full Fathom Five itself.
Comments: 2
Kudos: 7





	The rock came down and...

_The primitive was injured, dying probably. Slowing them down almost certainly. The action was born of cold logic, they'd all be caught if they continued to support him. The Doctor grasped the yellowing boulder in his hand, focused on the injured man and resolved to do what had to be done.  
  
_ _The rock came down and…_

In the Dalek City on radiation blighted Skaro the Doctor slipped through the carnage. Brave, noble Thals dying around him; Susan and the two irritants doing their best to keep up even as that fool Chesterpot nattered on about helping where they could. There were more important matters to attend to, they needed the fluid-link. Once it was recovered he could turn his attentions to dealing with the Daleks.   
  
It wasn’t like the teacher’s words were reflected in action anyway, this tended to be the case with lofty speeches in the Doctor’s experience. Still, he’d been useful in radicalising the Thals. A direct assault on the city was the perfect cover for recovering the device and if the planet was saved in the process? Well, that would just be one less issue he had to deal with, wouldn’t it?

_The rock came down and…_

He is Ramón Salamander, the world’s shopkeeper. Beloved in public, he has used his status to manipulate and corrupt the powers of the World Zone Authority to his own ends. Pursuing a ruthless, single-minded conquest of the world he has murdered and schemed for decades.  
  
Or at least, that’s what they think.  
  
Ramón Salamander is dead. His corpse left rotting in a tunnel, the Doctor once again slipping into his life. Astrid Ferrier and her allies only wanted him stopped, the delicate balance of power restored, but there’s so much more he could do with Salamander’s influence. It would have been easy to run off, leave things as they were. Afforded a few more hours in the life of Ramón Salamander the Doctor changes the face of the world.

_The rock came down and…_

On a cold, rain-soaked moor he finalises the last explosive in a chain that will collapse the cave system. The Brigadier pensively watching as he works. Dutiful even in discomfort, the man is grimly determined to see the matter through to the end. 

"Not getting cold feet are we Alistair?" The Doctor smiles grimly. 

"No, I...we both agree this is necessary it's just...is there really no other option Doctor? The peace treaty…" 

"In better circumstances perhaps," he sighs. "You saw what happened to the infected, the chaos at Waterloo. We simply cannot rely on their goodwill." He offered the detonator. Alister was a friend but he was a commanding officer above all else. It was only fitting he be the one to pull the trigger. "For the future," he prompted, guiding Alister's hands around the device. "For all mankind."   
  
When Liz finds out what they’ve done she can't look either of them in the eye.

_The_ _rock came down and…  
_

Skaro again. A younger Skaro, bursting with life and blighted as always. An irritating diversion foisted on him, the price paid for his continued freedom. The Daleks emerging from their conflict with the Thals aeons ago and centuries in their own future to spread out across the stars with a single-minded drive. A toxic spill in the waters of eternity.

His fault allegedly.   
  
The Daleks must die, that much is clear. The Doctor has no argument there, but the suggested method is crude, lacking in finesse. Allowing himself to be captured, he plots their downfall from the comfort of an interrogation cell. He is a stellar manipulator, words echoing down the centuries as he tells Davros exactly what he wants to hear. The empire dead a scant two-thousand years after its founding. Undone by advice that was only ever beneficial on the surface.

_The rock came down and…  
_

Castrovalva, the flirtation is at an end. The city collapsing around them, the Master’s attention darts between the Doctor and the body hanging in a network of something that only looks like web on the surface.  
  
“You...you.” he stammers through a stolen voice.  
  
“A mercy after everything you’ve done to him.” the Doctor declares, gun shaking with the effort it takes to get the words out. They’re objectionable things, but useful in the right hands. It could easily become a crutch but faced with the scale of the Master’s latest scheme and his own weakened form there was no other option. He’s indulged his old friend too long, his presence in his life as much an affectation as dress capes and vintage cars.  
  
It has to end.

_The rock came down and…  
_

Home, or near enough _._ He’s facing himself allegedly. His shadowy accuser bleating indignantly deep within the matrix, voluminous robes sagging with a faintly comical weight as he attempts to posture through the collapse of whatever grand ploy he had in mind with the trial.  
  
“Don’t you see!” his arms flap wildly. “Don’t you see where you’re taking us, the depths you’re dragging us into?”  
  
“You know if I really were you, or you really were me I’d never be this sore a loser”  
  
“Oh you conceited little shi...” the voice snarls, but by then he’s all but gone. Robes collapsing in the wake of his sudden, wholly involuntary abdication. 

_The rock came down and…  
_

The Doctor guides the girl from Iceworld out of the TARDIS, a firm hand on her shoulder ejecting her from this world back into her own. Perivale, nice enough if you like that sort of thing. She wanted to stay of course, especially after everything Mel had told her. He couldn’t blame her, he’d want to escape this sort of life as well, but there were too many coincidences. Something was pulling her strings, something familiar. The girl watches the box vanish and sighs, trudging back towards her old routines having caught a glimpse of something larger, more important than any prospect she can imagine.  
  
Nearly forty years previously a bonfire built on the scrubland beyond Maidens' Point draws sleek, rumbling bombers off-course. The village and nearby military base are all but destroyed in the ensuing inferno. A dismal little house in a damp little street in Perivale forty years later barely registering the sudden change to the people living within it.

_The rock came down and…  
_

He’s in the DEEP, Vollmer’s corpse continuing to mutate even in death. Low, warbling klaxon warning him that his own death is close if he doesn’t take action soon. He moves the body as best he can, slipping the still-warm gun into the back of his trousers as he clambers into the escape pod.  
  
He can feel the TARDIS at the back of his mind, itching away at him even as the pod draws him further from the facility. He doesn’t want to abandon it, doesn’t want to be trapped on this planet but what choice does he have? The facility explodes, subsonic rumble shaking the escape pod violently as the detonation wave reaches him.

_The rock came down and…  
_

There is a girl, young, uncomprehending. He delivers the news personally, hates every second of it. Vollmer’s words hanging heavy as he does his best to etch out some sort of existence here. Trapped again.  
  
Self-inflicted exile.  
  
He helps the family as best as he can; at a distance at first but inevitably he is drawn into their lives. Inevitably they are drawn into his, doing what he can to preserve Vollmer’s memory even as he hides his own role in the man’s death for the benefit of them all.  
  
He fights the good fight, indulges his adventurous spirit where he can. Continues to fight to preserve stability, to limit the chaos, the death. The ship lingers in his mind, a phantom lover kissing softly, calling out to him from somewhere dark and cold. In time the radiation will subside, in time he will return to her.

_The rock came down and…  
_

He is reborn, cold and confused. Throat dry and scratchy, struggling to remember how he got here, how he died. A woman is pointing a gun at him, something horrendous lurking over her shoulder. The two figures are faintly familiar.  
  
The bullet hits before he can properly place them.

_The rock came down and…  
  
...his hand stopped, hovering just above the stricken man’s skull. Gently dropping the rock, the Doctor produced a handkerchief and applied it to the man’s forehead. This was no time to be rash, he could remove the obstacle, of course, but in doing so he would alienate his allies._  
  
_He had few of them here, and those he did have were already cautious around him. The savages were bad enough, but ensuring the two teachers continued to support him was imperative. Killing the injured man would only cement their view of him, it would even risk driving Susan away. Better to show compassion, mercy, it was important to be canny about these things._  
  
_The end would ultimately justify the means._  
  
_He was sure of this._


End file.
